BEN KWELLER//
WORDS: RACHEL ANTONOFF//
PHOTO: JAY CHEN FOR SUPMAG.COM//

It takes a special kind of person to want to be a freelance writer. If you're a fan of steady income and fat paychecks, it's probably not the job for you. The greatest pitfall of the job, however, might be the interview. Depending on the subject, it can be tricky to say the least. My personal experiences have run the gamete from rude and cranky to frightening to downright absurd (sadly, I wont name names).
If those are typical examples of the interview experience, consider Ben Kweller to be extremely atypical. Right off the bat, he makes me feel less like I'm prying into the life of a stranger and more like we are long lost best friends. The fact that Kweller is an absolute pleasure to be around is mere icing on the cake. With the latest edition to the BK menagerie, his self-titled third album, Kweller has given us a sweetly-tinged, extended love letter of a record and it is--without a doubt-his best yet.
This is Ben Kweller all grown up, a fact only further supported by the birth of his first child. Kweller gave me the details on being a dad, curing pre-show jitters and having Dave Matthews in his living room, during what will now always be known as one of the greatest interviews I've ever been a part of.

So you just had a baby.
His name is Dorian. Dorian Kweller.

It must be hard to be away.
Actually we travel together. It's the coolest, it's the way to do it. We have one of these country singer buses, you know, with the bedroom in the back.

So cozy.
Yea, it's so family and wholesome and nice. It's very Shania Twain, you know? The Ben Kweller thing is sort of a family business now. My wife runs Merkie, which is my merch business.

If you could have your own Traveling Wilburys, who would be in it?
Ok. Well, it would be me, obviously [laughs] and Julian Casablancas, and um, Adam Green and Caleb Followill and Conor Oberst. Yea, that would be enough.

Definitely Enough. Do you still get nervous before shows?
I get really neurotic before my gigs. I pace around. Get butterflies. I used to do toe touches. And if my throat starts freaking out, I take Halls obsessively. I use the yellow kind, the honey lemon.

Really? I use Riccola.
I need the heavy duty. Riccola's more like peppermint candy, I'm used to the hard stuff.

So you played all the instruments on your record. What made you decide to do that?
Well, originally I was gonna do it was a band and I was meeting with this producer, Gil, in London. I was sitting at his kitchen table and he just said, 'I really think you should play all the instruments.' And I asked him why and he said, 'These songs are so autobiographical and so personal, I just think you should put your fingerprint on every track and it will be 100% Ben Kweller.'

What's your favorite song off the record?
Thirteen. The piano song. Ooh, it's just the best love song I've ever written.

What song, by any artist, puts a lump in your throat every time you hear it?
"Girl from North Country" by Bob Dylan. Not the Johnny Cash version, the original. When he says "Please see/That she wears a coat so warm." Just the whole idea that you're telling someone if you go to this place, you're gonna run into this girl that was my true love. That's just so sad.

You know, I once heard this fantastic thing about you. That you and your wife used to have dinner parties/talent shows in your apartment?
Yeah! We haven't done it in a while, but we used to do that, we used to have these talent nights. Just invite a bunch of people over and have some drinks and dinner, and someone would juggle or freestyle rap. The best were the non-musicians, like random magic tricks or yoyo.

What was the weirdest one?
Dave Matthews actually came over once and I begged him to play "Crash". He didn't want to play it and I just begged and begged. He was sitting in a chair and I was sitting on the floor just holding onto his leg saying, 'Please play "Crash"!' And he finally did! And that was amazing, to hear something like that in your living room.

That's a pretty amazing story.
Yeah, it was so fun. Back when I first came to New York there was more of a community. There are so many people in New York that take everything so seriously and just want to be famous. Bands now seem to spend too much time getting clothes and going to good parties instead of just playing music. And music is a tradition, man. Now I feel like too many people are too cool for school.

When you were a kid, what did you want to be when you grew up?
There was this trash man that came and I used to ride my tricycle out to meet him at the curb. His name was Fonzel, and I told my mom that I wanted to be like Fonzel when I grew up. And she said, you can be the trash man as long as you can be the best trash man you can be. Then when I was eight, I went through my dad's record collection and heard "All You Need Is Love" and I just listened over and over again until it made me cry. That's when I said to myself, I wanna do this. I wanna make people cry. I wanna make music. And that was it for me.

So do you think you would be Fonzel if you weren't doing this?
(Laughs) I don't know. Maybe not the trash man. But I have serious respect for him. I would probably be a bass fisherman, yeah, that's what I would love to do.